Is there someone on this forum who is tracking and trying to fix some of these bugs?

If not (or if that person would like another pair of hands to help) I'm happy to offer my services. I'm experienced at customising/debugging php and MySQL and would be happy to work through the bug list in my spare time.

Also, is there a bug-list where users can identify issues and suggest improvements?

Before criticising the state of tMP (not TMP ), which is used and loved by many in its current non-W3-validated form, perhaps you should sort out your own website. Validated it may be, correctly functional it is not.

Perhaps your remarks would have been better addressed to vbulletin. Oh, and I think Microsoft Corp. might have a few buggy issues with which you could help them

Hi Marc, We appreciate everyone who wants to make a positive contribution to the site.
Most of the coding of the site is done by John (TheMusicMan, the site owner), sometimes with the help of other external people for specific tasks. So if you have anyideas or offers, I think it's best you contact him directly.

It's replies like this that make me wonder why I try to make a positive contribution here.

I didn't knock anyone involved with the site and don't see any need to. I know everyone working here are trying to do good things. If no opinions or help are welcome consider my hand lowered.

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You are putting words into my mouth. I didn't say that no opinions or help are welcome. Opinions and help are what make this site tick. I expressed my opinion (in what I thought was a moderate fashion, Steve).

I'm sure that, if you had put your concerns and offer in a pm to the site owner, you would have received an appropriate response (whatever that might be).

I viewed the creation of this thread as being somewhat tactless - a bit like going in for a free lunch then complaining that the soup isn't hot enough. Surely you wouldn't then complain in a loud voice for everyone to hear. You would have a quiet word with the chef, wouldn't you?

I wasn't that I'm bagging the 'free lunch' - I see elsewhere requests for helps, suggestions for improvements etc... I'm keen to help and now I know who to approach about it.

I was in a grump last night and took Wherryman's reply to heart for which I apologise.

Also, Wherryman, I have a bugs/improvements needed list with a dozen or so things in regard to my own website, I would be grateful to know what problems you have seen as I'm sure there are things I've missed.

I had a quick look at that validation website, and while there defenitely were a couple of coding bugs (like non-matching tags), other things on the list just seemed silly to me. Like "SRC" needs to be "src". As far as I knoz, HTML is not case sensitive? What difference does it make to 99.999% of the normal websurfers that use a fairly recent version of IE, Firefox, Opera, Safari, Chrome, Seamonkey or whatever other browser?

I'm not an expert but my understanding is that as well as spotting potential 'errors' the markup validation process also compares code to international standards. Many big companies have one or more people who's sole existence is to work with W3C to review and meet these standards.

The advantage to webmasters is not so much in having certification of a 'functional' website but more about having 'interoperable' code.

Imagine if every coder had their own flavour of writing, even if it's just their choice of upper/lowercase for certain commands - things soon look messy and confusing. The decision was made by the internet gods that html should be in lowercase.

Also, different browsers do interpret the same code differently. There are problems in my preview pages which cause them to be displayed differently (on my bug list, but needs a time consuming manual fix) - compare this page in IE and Firefox: http://www.emusic-online.com/preview/mmi90403.htm

As a webuser, I only care if the website looks ok in my browser.
Most modern browsers include some sort of error-checking and interpretation routines, while still trying to follow (mostly) the international standards (maybe a little less in IE?). So most websites still show up fine in all browsers, even if the code isn't 100% w3c-validationproof.
Of course I fully support that every webprogrammer should try to follow the international standards as closely as possible. But some people make too much drama of even the sligthest validation errors in a website (I'm not talking about you here, I 've seen these kinds of discussions before on other forums and websites).
HTML is a tool, not an artform...

Agreed. When I programme I try to get things working right, then looking right, then really (W3C) right. I will put a working, presentable change in to the production version of my site and worry about W3C later when I have spare time.

Some of the bugs I'd like to see tackled here are signatures (why do they vanish when a user is logged in?) and images (they parse to links when logged in) and why the log-in box is still visible on some pages when I have logged in. These all seem to be clumsy bugs left in by the software developers. At worst they are small annoyances, but they've been around for a while suggesting that our Mouthpiece maintenance crew need some help with either skills or the time to deal with them.

Sorry if I have created what seems to be a critical thread, I'm hoping to build bridges, not burn them.

We have an area here where people can report errors or issues, and most of the issues that get reported are dealt with.

I was a little confused when I spotted your initial post which is titled 'TMP Bugs'; which implies there are bugs on tMP - i.e. items that people associate with an error on the site, rather than a coding standards issue with the underlying PHP code - which should really be addressed by Jellsoft themsleves - not me.

The problem I see with taking you up on your offer is that should we work to remove the vBulletin PHP errors in the code, is that I will then be doing something that Jellsoft perhaps should be responsible for. Also - what would happen if the underlying code here on tMP is amended, then I upgrade vBulletin...? If Jellsoft hadn't taken onboard any of the amendments or bugs you'd identified and fixed (fixes perhaps - though I am also not sure they would consider them fixes), then we're back to introducing them into the code each time I upgraded the vB version and I am then reliant on you to fix them again for me. Not a good scenario I'm sure you'd agree.

One further point, I could be wrong because I am not sure exactly what it is that you refer to... but that the fact sigs sometimes disappear when you're logged in is an admin setting and is not necessarily a bug, rather a choice. I can set which forums show sigs, or the fact that they only show in the users 1st post in a thread and not in subsequent threads.

Thanks MusicMan, yeah the standards thing is being overplayed a bit (regret mentioning it now!), but poor care in this area is often a symptom of bigger problems.

The software my site is built on is very similar in design (with the same language and database) to vBulletin and I have the same issues when I make a change or upgrade - making sure a developer upgrade doesn't undo my work. There are a few tools and methods to get around the problem (testing, careful backups and keeping a detailed changelog and library of altered files) most of which are sensible things programmers do anyway to protect their own code from stupid mistakes!

Basically, you're in charge, if you feel it might be worth a try making some changes I'm happy to have a go and we can talk details in private.

Equally, if you're largely happy with things and don't want to let some unknown mess around with the code that is also cool

I was a little confused when I spotted your initial post which is titled 'TMP Bugs'; which implies there are bugs on tMP - i.e. items that people associate with an error on the site, rather than a coding standards issue with the underlying PHP code - which should really be addressed by Jellsoft themsleves - not me.

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I haven't looked at the "bugs" in detail, but they might also be caused by the customizations that have been done to the forum software, like the custom skin, the menubar, the links at the top and bottom of the page, the ads on the right or the scrolling ads at the top of the page.

Agreed. When I programme I try to get things working right, then looking right, then really (W3C) right. I will put a working, presentable change in to the production version of my site and worry about W3C later when I have spare time.

Some of the bugs I'd like to see tackled here are signatures (why do they vanish when a user is logged in?) and images (they parse to links when logged in) and why the log-in box is still visible on some pages when I have logged in.

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To be honnest, I haveb't seen any of these bugs myself.
No signatures: this is a setting in your user panel. You can switch off signatures if you want.
Images parsed to links: no idea what you mean. Do you have a screenshot?
Log-in box visible: on what pages? Could this be caused by your browser's coookie-settings?

I had a quick look at that validation website, and while there defenitely were a couple of coding bugs (like non-matching tags), other things on the list just seemed silly to me. Like "SRC" needs to be "src". As far as I knoz, HTML is not case sensitive?

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HTML isn't, but xhtml has to be in lower case. As the markup tags are the same for each, I expect the validation site probably just flags all upper case tags as incorrect. Looking at the source on this page, the doctype flag (the very first line) indicates that tMP is in xhtml so theoretically SRC is incorrect.

However, it doesn't seem to make the slightest difference to whatever browser you view the site in, which is the important thing! :wink:

As stated before these are minor annoyances at worst, but perhaps worth fixing.

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I'm pretty sure that the options "show signatures" "show avatars" and "show images" turned ON by default. So if you don't see them while you are logged in, this surely must mean that at some point, you have turned these options off. This certainly is not a bug.

The "undefined" error I have never seen before. But I use Firefox instead opf IE. Maybe other IE users can tell us if they have seen the same?

In the last screen shot, are you talking about the "log out"' link in the menu bar? Indeed, that doesn't seme to make sense, since you are already logged out. But why would you ever want to log out from tMP...